When Noel eventually takes the court for the Sixers, he has a chance to drastically improve the Sixers defense. If Noel is just average, he should step in and be an immediate upgrade over Spencer Hawes, Kwame Brown and Lavoy Allen.

The trio of centers the Sixers trotted out onto the court last season were arguably the worst group in the league. 82Games.com, a site that breaks down the game beyond normal statistics, ranked the Sixers centers as a group 28th out of 30 teams. Only the Oklahoma City Thunder and Charlotte Bobcats were worse. Using the PER stat, which gives players a single score based on their offensive and defensive play, the Sixers centers averaged an 14.7.

To put that in perspective, the average PER score is a 15. Teams with some of the top centers in the league- such as the Los Angeles Lakers and Brooklyn Nets- both had a PER score over 20 at the center position.

To make matters worse, the Sixers centers allowed opposing centers to average a 18.8 PER score. That is a difference of over 4 points from what the Sixers centers averaged, and close to the 20 PER score that the top centers in the league reach.

It is going to take a special player to save the sinking ship that is the Sixers' center group. Luckily, Noel showed during his time at Kentucky that not only is he a special player- he could potentially be an all-time great.

Waiting For Next Year, a Cleveland based website, did an excellent job breaking down just how phenomenal Noel was on defense during his brief college career. He had an incredible PER score of 27.3 at Kentucky. Noel averaged 4.4 blocks per game last season to go along with 2.1 steals. That means combined, Noel averaged a whopping 6.5 defensive plays per game.

Since the 1999-2000 college season, only two players have averaged a higher combined number of blocks and steals. Anthony Davis, last year's number one pick, averaged a combined 6.1 blocks/steals a game during his college career.

Jacob Rosen, the author of the piece, took the comparisons for Noel a step further. Rosen took a look at some of the best defensive big men in the history of the league, and how they fared defensively in college. Rosen compared Noel's production to players like Shaquille O'Neal and Dikembe Mutombo, and averaged them out to 36 minutes.

Rosen found that only Hakeem Olajuwan (8.0 average) and David Robinson (7.5) scored higher than Noel did, who came out with an average of 7.3 steals/blocks per game over 36 minutes. That means Noel had more of an impact on defense than all-time great players like Mutombo, O'Neal, Alonzo Mourning and Marcus Camby.

Obviously, the difference between the college and professional game. The only two players to average more blocks/steals per game than Noel did since 1999-2000 (Alabama A&M’s Mickell Gladness in 2006 and Northeastern’s Shawn James in 2005) never even set foot on an NBA court. The transition will not be an easy one, especially when you throw in the fact Noel is returning from an ACL tear.

Still, the numbers don't lie, and they show Noel has a chance to be an elite defensive center with the Sixers.